Brittney and her husband were in the 9th year of operating their startup when they decided they wanted to take on a new challenge: ETA. After only a couple months of searching, they found their acquisition, a garage door company in Kansas City.
Post close, they faced a difficult truth. There was a lot of clean up to do. The seller had not been operating efficiently and had been doing a ton of work himself. For months they worked 12 hour days.
My conversation with Brittney highlights a common challenge that new owners must contend with–the balance of learning the ropes of the business with the work of making it your own.
00:00 Start
01:30 How Brittney got interested in ETA
04:00 Initial search criteria
06:32 How she found her business & why it appealed to her
09:15 Financials of the deal
13:43 Lessons learned from the search
19:55 Why operating costs were higher than expected
22:44 The unanticipated challenges of business ownership
26:05 The first few months of ownership
28:45 Brittney’s current day to day
30:14 Improving operations and making the business their own
35:53 Plans for the next year
36:36 The impact of being an industry outsider
39:10 Reflections on starting a business vs. buying a business
45:38 Retaining employees after acquisition
49:32 What Brittney has learned about herself through ETA
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Connect with me: LinkedIn | Twitter | keira@arenacommercialcapital.com
Connect with Brittney: LinkedIn